all I ever knew of love
by fandrastic
Summary: and while she's never been good with responsibilities, this whole 'being pregnant' thing allows her to eat like, all the time, so that's a plus. sam centric spam. warnings inside.


hello dears, I'm back with another sam centric sam/spencer oneshot! this one, if you've read any of my other pieces, is purposely written to sound different, sound darker and from a less mature POV, so I hope you do your best to forge ahead. :)

also, this is definitely a sam centric story, but I ship Spam, so there's definitely that pairing laced throughout the entirety of this.

**warnings:** raunchy/sweary/angsty **BUT THE RATING IS MOSTLY FOR LANGUAGE.**

**THINGS IN THE STORY THAT THE AUTHOR DOES NOT CONDONE:** super!gratuitous swearing, unprotected sex, underage smoking/drinking, eating disorders, and illegal drug usage.

fandrastic is a prude.

title lyrics are lovingly borrowed from _Criminal _by Fiona Apple

* * *

-x-

_what i need is a good defense  
'cause i'm feeling like a criminal  
and i need to be redeemed  
to the one i've sinned against  
because he's all i ever knew of love_

_**criminal—fiona apple**_

-x-

* * *

She loses her virginity in the back of a beat up Honda Civic when she's seventeen (_almost eighteen, she feels ridiculous that it's taken this damn long_) with a boy two years older than her and practically two feet taller than her. He fucks her hard and she bleeds (_a lot_) and she cries (_a little_) but it mixes in together with her sweat and his sweat and it all makes for better lubrication, so what the hell, right?

What the hell.

Peter (_because that was his name, Peter Beresford, age twenty_) doesn't talk to her the next day after she gets out of school and that suits her just fine, because the beat up Honda was hers and she kicked him out as soon as she could believably fake an orgasm (_she might not be book smart but she's a fast learner_). At the time, he had stared at her with this incredulous sort of look as she dismissed him, his jeans still pooled around his ankles and his face flushed with exertion or embarrassment or whatever while she waved him off in disinterest.

If she hadn't been so damn _thankful_ that she could cross that off of her list (_cherry: popped_), she might've felt a little bit guilty. But she doesn't break hearts—she breaks bones and if Peter can't handle the rejection now, he sure as hell won't be able to handle it later. In a body cast.

Carly and Freddie think she's acting differently, and they're worried about her, but what Carly and Freddie don't know won't hurt them.

She wonders if anyone saw her in the parking lot. Perhaps the Bushwell lot wasn't the greatest spot to choose. Oh well.

* * *

She tries smoking cigarettes almost exactly a month later, because God knows she doesn't have enough bad habits already. Her fake ID works wonders at the gas station down the street (_but that might be from the help of her push-up bra_) and she takes the pack of Marlboros up to the roof top of Bushwell Plaza alone (_she's not stupid, she knows she's going to cough like an idiot until she gets used to the sensation of slowly killing herself_).

The smoke burns her lungs exactly like she thought it would and she knows each cigarette will take like twelve minutes or something like that off of her life, but that little white stick between her lips keeps her from stuffing her goddamn face full of food, so that's great.

It's all so great.

Her clothes stink and her hair stinks and smoking gets kind of boring after a while, but it's been like four hours and she hasn't had a single thing to eat, so she's proud. She smokes the entire pack in one sitting and it makes her so sick that she vomits right there on the roof (_but she can't find the heart to care_).

She wants to quietly sneak out of the building, but ends up stuck taking the elevator down to the lobby with Spencer (_of all people_) and she _knows_ he can smell the smoke on her, but neither of them says anything. Besides, he's not her older brother, so he can't scold her like he can scold Carly.

But he gives her a _look_.

When she goes home she showers off the stale smell and ends up not buying any more cigarettes because it's actually an expensive habit and she'd rather spend her money on other stuff. Whatever.

* * *

A week after she turns eighteen, Peter tells her he misses her and he looks so pathetic that she follows him back to his place and lets him fuck her. This time she doesn't have to fake her orgasm. He really is a good looking guy to be honest, with lovely dark hair and lovely dark eyes, but he's just… he's not… she doesn't know what, but he's not it.

She leaves right after, even though he yells over and over again that she's a cold hearted bitch.

He's totally wrong about that, but she's not concerned enough to correct him.

* * *

Her period is late.

She cries until she makes herself sick.

Carly calls her (_like a million billion zillion times_) when she misses school, but she puts the phone on silent to shut up the sound.

Her period finally shows up.

She cries until she makes herself sick.

Freddie tells her she looks like death when he next sees her at rehearsal, but she's so fucking _relieved_ that she only trips him down the stairs once. Spencer watches from the living room with a frown as Freddie tumbles but it's not like he's never laughed at Freddie getting hurt before, so whatever.

Freddie's surprised when she extends him her arm and chalks up his 'accident' to her superhuman strength. Whoops.

* * *

Gibby, of all people, throws a party—and not just any party. Like, 'the party of the year' type of party.

She gets totally trashed (_there is so much booze_).

It's obvious that she's just as sloppy of a drunk as her fucking deadbeat mother. Carly and Freddie are both pleasantly, goofily buzzed, leaning against one another and laughing at every little thing. She can hardly walk, which is probably a good thing because she sees her old ex Jonah there and she'd probably go over and knee him in the balls. Just because she can.

She can do anything.

She turns back to tell Carly and Freddie, but they're too busy giggling and trading messy kisses. She fakes gagging noises. They don't seem to hear her and the party is just too… it's just… she doesn't want to be there anymore, okay?

She catches a cab (_it's nothing like in the movies_) back to Bushwell and breaks into 8-C, clutching her stilettos in her hands like she's some slut coming back from prom. Maybe she is (_she's too drunk to be bothered with thinking_). Spencer's sitting on the sofa in his pajamas with his sketchbook in his hand (_she'd make a comment about his idea of a fun Friday night but she's struggling to even stand_) and he glances up at her with this disappointed _look_.

"You're drunk, Sam."

She has a comeback ready on the tip of her tongue (_she's goddamn Sam Puckett, of course she does_) but Spencer turns back to his sketchbook and it leaves the words trapped in her mouth. She's drunk, but there's a feeling of shame that sobers her slightly.

Gibby has another party planned for next month, but she totally blows it off. Because why on earth would she want to stick around and watch Carly and Freddie exchange saliva with each other? Gross, right?

* * *

She graduates, and instead of feeling like she's on fucking cloud nine (_this is what she'd been praying for_) she feels like she's falling without a parachute. School was mind numbing and a waste of her valuable time, but it always was a constant, and heaven only knows how few of those she has in her life.

She debates about going naked underneath her cap and gown, just for the shock value, but it's been done before and she's got too much respect for ol' Ted Franklin to do that at the ceremony (_he's one of the few people she does respect_). But Carly and Freddie are under the impression that she plans on doing so, and ask her every ten goddamn minutes if she's wrinkling her graduation dress by slouching like that. Really, it's just a ploy to prove that she's dressed. She slouches ever more just to make Freddie do that neck vein bulging-thing he does when he's getting angry. He does and she laughs and laughs and laughs (_even though it's really not that funny at all_).

When she gets out of the car, Carly fusses over her like the mother that neither of them ever really had and she bats her hands away. Spencer seems distant and tells them how much they look grown up.

She looks grown up (_oh how she has them fooled_).

She lets Carly straighten her clothes because what the hell, life's full of simple pleasures. Whatever tickles your goddamn peach, Carly Shay.

It's terrifying when her name is called and it's terrifying when she walks across the stage and it's terrifying to grasp that leather booklet that holds her permission slip for adulthood. Briefly she scans the audience; where Mrs. Benson is wailing and Melanie is beaming (_her mother isn't there, naturally_) and Spencer just gazes, gives her a _look_, like he's so proud of her.

She smiles (_and it's like somebody turned on the fucking sun_) but it's only because it's finally over and she can finally get on with her life, right?

* * *

She gets pregnant in San Francisco three years later.

The kid's father is perpetually wasted and a bona fide deadbeat (_like mother like daughter_) and he looks laughingly grave when she tells him the news. He asks her if she's going to keep it—keep it like it's a pet (_or an old birthday card or spare change in the bottom of a payphone_).

Clearly she's not mother material (_she barely had one herself_) because she drinks and she smokes (_sometimes_) and sleeps with losers with no prospects. But there was something about _'are you keeping it?' _that lights a fire within her, a fire she hasn't felt in a long long long time.

He doesn't protest when she leaves (_when they leave_), he just waves and goes back to what he was doing when she met him—nothing.

She doesn't know the first thing about having a baby (_she can't even think about raising one yet_) but it's almost like she's been given a second chance, like here Sam, here's this perfectly good kid that _you_ made. Now whatever you do, don't fuck her up. And while she's never been good with responsibilities, but this whole 'being pregnant' thing allows her to eat like, all the time, so that's a plus.

Slowly she makes her way back up to Washington, because Seattle is familiar in the way that nothing else seems to be, even though her Mom's run off… somewhere with… someone. Mel's living with her fiancé in this gorgeous high-rise and they're _so_ ecstatic to take her in (_take them in_) that for once, she pushes aside her negative feelings and lets the idea of being wanted wash over it and it feels pretty damn wonderful.

She feels wonderful.

Her doctor tells her that the kid's a girl. She's glad she finally knows, that's not really something she wants to be surprised about, and Mel's all over her case to pick out some fake-classy name like Emma or Ava or whatever the hell is at the top of the list on that baby name website she bookmarked.

She's pretty sure she's going to name the kid (_her_) Cassidy anyway, but she finds that humoring Melanie is a lot less stressful than trying to chase her around the kitchen (_even though she's pretty fucking speedy for a pregnant chick_).

* * *

Everything is going pretty damn swimmingly until Mel's fiancé finds out that his job is sending him somewhere crazy and he and Mel are all of a sudden moving to Singapore or Hong Kong and she's about to become a homeless person. They're so upset to leave her (_and Cassidy_) but she sort of figured all along that she's been happy for long enough, and it's about time that crap starts happening again. It's the story of her life, basically. Mel scolds her when she refers to herself as a 'preggo hobo' and tells her that Spencer's offered up Carly's old room and that he'll be over in the morning to help bring her stuff over. She doesn't even know what to think.

Apparently her sister left out the whole 'bun in the oven' thing to Spencer, because when he shows up the next day looking exactly the same as he did three years ago (_it's like he hasn't aged a fucking day_) he gives her this _look_ that she can't decipher and it makes her chest hurt.

She chalks it up to heartburn or something because whatever Cassidy's been doing lately (_growing, kicking, whatever_) is seriously making her miserable. But according to her baby book, heartburn is totally normal so she tries not to worry about it. That's definitely what it is.

* * *

It's almost like she's in the twilight zone or something because Spencer's treating her like the last three years (_of not communicating_) never happened and that she's the same spitfire _kiddo_ that she was when she last saw him. But she sees his eyes drawn to her obvious baby bump (_Cass is gonna be such a meatloaf!_) and she knows it's difficult for him to see her like this.

Things last this way for a month before he breaks down, throwing his latest sculpture on the ground and raking his hands through his long-ish hair and giving her a _look_ that makes her place her hand on her stomach like all those stupid pregnant ladies she never wanted to emulate. There's something in his eyes that troubles her, and all of a sudden he's on his knees and begging her to forgive him for failing her as a kid. She kind of wants to laugh because that was never his job and she never expected him to save her, but laughing would probably break him at the moment.

So she awkwardly kneels down next to him and awkwardly rubs his back (_like Mel did when she showed up on her doorstep_) and he clings to her like he would a mast in a storm or something. The moment is sort of lightened when Cassidy kicks the shit out of her ribs and she has to inelegantly scold her stomach for being such a goddamn moment-ruiner. Spencer laughs (_which is good, it means he's not freaking out_) and places his hand where Cass is practicing her awesome ninja moves, just like her mama.

Her breathing gets all weird because like, only Mel's ever touched her stomach like that and then he's talking to her stomach (_to Cassidy_) in this soft, gentle voice that she can't really hear clearly, but she hears things like _'the best' _and_ 'awesome mama' _and_ 'stay here in the loft'_ and her heart is beating so fast that she wonders if he (_and Cassidy_) can tell.

Spencer glances up and gives her this _look_ and she thinks that he probably can, but people always get emotional and mushy over babies, so… whatever. But sheesh, Cass isn't even out in the real world yet and she's already tugging on heartstrings.

* * *

Spencer goes like, legit fucking crazy when he baby-proofs the loft.

He thinks it'll only be a one day project, but weeks go on. Like, hello, he catches stuff on fire regularly; of course he's going to be busy with a lot of proofing. She doesn't help much because he's acting all weird and protector-y and there's lots of _"I'll take care of it, Sam, why don't you just sit down?"_ and she just wants to punch him. She's pregnant, not terminal, for Christ sake.

He keeps mumbling to himself how he wished he had more warning and time to plan and she wants to laugh, because he's not the pregnant soon-to-be single parent, she is. He says that it shouldn't be like this, that there should be a baby shower and a nursery and pastel paint (_but when has anything they've ever done gone according to plan?_). If things were the way they were planned to be, Carly and Freddie would be married with 2.5 children, Spencer would be like, Alexander Calder famous, and she'd be an invisible ninja—one that was not pregnant.

He brings out Carly's old crib that has been hiding somewhere in storage, and she wonders if he's been saving it for when (_and if_) he has his own kids. She feels kind of weird when she watches him set it up (_he still won't let her help_) because… because he's not doing this for his kid and they're definitely not a couple. But he looks really excited so she lets him put it together. It takes him like fifty tries because he can't find the instructions, and she gets ridiculously bored, but in the end, there is a crib and suddenly it's all very real, it's real that she's a mother.

She's a mother.

Sure, she hasn't popped yet, but she's definitely in an irreversible condition. The idea sort of staggers the shit out of her, and yet she's not as terrified as she was before. Like, if her own crappy mom could keep her alive this long, then raising a kid can't be _too _difficult. Can it?

But she's still kind of freaked out. Her due date is in about a week and a half, and while the loft is pretty much padded to the gills, she's still apprehensive about _having_ the baby. She's well aware that on her due date, it's not like she's going to open the front door and see Cassidy there waiting for her. No, the little goober has to protest its way out of her body, and it's something she's not really looking forward to.

Melanie's forwarded her a bunch of pretentious blogs by new mothers who gush over and over again how the pain of labor the sheer terror of giving birth disappears when they finally hold that slimy little screamer in their arms. She kind of doesn't want to think about it. She figures the hospital people are going to have everything taken care of, and all she has to do is get pumped full of meds and push Cassidy out into the daylight.

She's scared, but she's more curious to see if Cass looks at all like her loser father (_the guy Spencer hasn't brought up once_) or if she's going to look like a Puckett. Either way, the kid's bound to be good looking, which is a relief, because she'd hate to be the too-young mom with an ugly baby.

* * *

Cassidy Norah Puckett makes herself known to the world a week later. She's average height, average weight, and looks just like her mother.

Cass is like, absolutely _perfect._

Labor was awful, like really awful and the fucking epidural she got was lopsided or something because only one side of her went numb, and the pain lasted forever and ever until she wanted to just give up and leave poor Cass to find another way out. But Spencer held her hand tightly (_while she practically broke his fingers_) and he kissed her temple fervently (_because there was no way she was going to let him watch it happen_) and Cassidy introduced herself with a cry that she swore she'd known all her life.

Ugh, Mel's stupid blogs were right.

There was an awkward moment when the doctors assumed that Spencer was Cass's father and wanted his name for the birth certificate, but like, she just gave birth in front of him, so the time for embarrassment was long over. The line reserved for the father's name stayed blank, and that's fine.

Everything's fine.

Cassidy is definitely the cutest person on the face of the planet, but she doesn't really do much. Like, at one point she yawned and Spencer practically had a coronary trying to find the camera in time to document it. No one will care if she yawns like five years from now, so Cass better appreciate all the trouble they went through to try and make her yawn again. Rubbing her back worked—telling boring stories did not.

They're supposed to stay in the hospital overnight, and Cass is all cute and curled up in her bassinet thing and Spencer's snoring softly in the uncomfortably looking chair next to her bed and she feels like she is the greatest, happiest person alive. Carly and Freddie are supposed to show up in the morning, hopefully with gifts, after flying out from New York, and she thinks that the adorable little bundle of newborn is going to be one hell of an ice breaker.

Cass fusses quietly (_ugh, even that sound is adorable_) and she wants to pick her up but she's _so _exhausted. Instead, Spencer jolts out of his sleeping state (_kind of like a ninja_) and gently picks the baby up like she's made of glass. Cass is definitely super taken with Spencer and settles right down against his chest, which is good because it means the she doesn't have to whip out her boob and feed the little meatloaf right there.

She wonders if Spencer is asleep again, because the room is quiet, but she turns and sees that he's gazing intently at her with this _look_ on his face, like she's some sort of hero or something.

"I…" he chokes up, "I am _so_ proud of you."

She gets a little weepy (_um, she pushed a baby out of her body earlier, she's allowed a few tears_) and Spencer kisses her temple again, and maybe she doesn't really have a home or a family, but this would do. This would definitely work.

She gives him a _look_ and she knows he feels the same way.

* * *

**tada! hope you enjoyed the sam centric angst (with undertones of spam~)!**

**please, be a dear and drop me a line to let me know what you think!**

**x**


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